Hopeless Devotion
by Lestatian
Summary: Someone reflecting on their lover's death and sliding deeper into insanity.


Disclaimer - I own nothing from Harry Potter, and I never will.  
  
Note: Okay, I do realize that this is kind of similar to Final Confession but it just sort of wrote itself this way. Review, please?  
  
Hopeless Devotion  
  
He told me he loved me. Right before he died. It was that which held me to him, not knowing whether I was in his heart, not knowing whether it was I that quickened him. He chose that night to alleviate my doubts, telling me it was me, had always been me and would always be me. And then he left.  
  
I mourned for him. I cut my hair, and constantly wore black. I still do. It emphasizes my unnaturally pale complexion, and reminds me of who I am and what I meant to somebody. I'll never forget. And, if given the choice, I never would.  
  
I should have known something was amiss. He'd been acting strange, refusing my caresses underneath the blankets and my kisses upon his lips. I knew that his father had brought him before the Dark Lord, but he had assured me he had not yet taken the mark. At first I believed him. But as he refused me again and again while assuring me nothing was wrong, I began to suspect. So when the opportunity presented itself, while he foolishly left the bathroom door unlocked when he was taking a shower, I slipped in and saw for myself.  
  
I think I already knew that he had lied to me. I just didn't want to admit it to myself, knowing that the symbol that had plagued my dreams was burnt into his skin. The Dark Lord could summon him just by snapping his fingers, and kill him just as easily. That knowledge didn't sit easy with me, and he knew it.  
  
We fought that night. He shrieked at me for invading his privacy and I shrieked back for him lying to me. Of course, he had the answer to that, and told me all the things I did not want to hear. He knew that would hurt me too. I left, feeling angrier than I had ever felt before.  
  
It was peculiar. I knew he had had no choice in taking the mark, but still I felt betrayed when I saw it dancing on his arm. It leapt when it saw me, curling and spitting, spraying its anger. Knowing that the thing that was so evil was ingrained forever on the arm of the one I loved almost killed me. But only after it killed him first.  
  
I hadn't told anyone about our affair. Looking back, I am still not sure if I did the right thing. I loved him so intensely that any separation would have hurt me beyond repair, and my friends would most certainly have set us apart. But if I had told somebody, would he still be alive today?  
  
I don't know why he left. It could have been for any reason. The temptation to blame myself is overwhelming, but too often have I been told it wasn't my fault. Everything came out after it happened. I guess I just couldn't come up with a good enough explanation that morning after I had found him dead on the floor. Knowing nobody cared about his death, not even those with whom he shared a house, wounded me more than anything. The knowledge of his death spread through the school. I felt so alone; knowing nobody shared my despair, knowing nobody mourned my beloved. I don't know how long I stayed with him that morning, my tears running unchecked down my cheeks, falling onto his lashes. He looked so peaceful. My little angel, asleep on the floor. But I knew he would never wake up. He wasn't snuffling, wasn't occasionally whispering my name, wasn't shifting, seeking my submission. The empty vial that had been on the counter, but was now smashed to bits, was also a bit of a giveaway.  
  
It was obvious he hadn't wanted me to find him. If he had, he would have done it on the floor of his room, the special place we had made our own. No. I had searched the castle for hours before I finally realized what an idiot I was and looked at the Marauder's map. He had chosen the farthest tower he could find. He knew it was only a matter of time before I found him.  
  
Fate plays a cruel game. I found him when he was still alive, before I knew what he planned to do. I had thought he wanted to draw me out, to show me something that he had prepared for me. Fool that I was, I thought it was all for me. I guess in a way it was.  
  
We talked. Not for long, but enough to confirm for me now that all was not well. He acted too loving, too sweet, too different from his previous behavior that I was lulled into a false sense of security and grew caught in the web he entangled around me. He was an intoxicant, he was my drug, and my mind grew hazy on the clouds of endearments, caresses, and whispers in my ear. He told me he loved me, that our souls would be together forever and that no one could ever tear us apart. I moaned at his words, not understanding his reason for saying them, but I ardently responded to his tender ministrations, and whispered back everything I had always wanted to tell him, but had never had the chance. Before that night, it had never seemed right.  
  
We made love that night. And it truly was, not the usual hard, grinding pace against the wall, but a slow, loving movement that confirmed for me that everything in my life had finally come into place. It didn't matter anymore that the only time we had together were the stolen moments that we had to get whenever we could. It didn't matter that for the past few months I had constantly had to lie to my friends, that I had had to stop practicing for Quidditch, and do all my homework when everyone else was out at Hogsmeade. Nothing mattered anymore, just the movement of him against me, the feel of his skin and the touch of his breath. It was beautiful. I truly know what it is like to share a soul. Why did he leave me?  
  
He waited until I was asleep before he crept away and consumed the contents of that carefully constructed liquid. Snape studied it afterwards. It had taken five days to brew, but was mercifully quick and free of pain. He would just have crumpled to the floor, and let the vial slide from his grip. I didn't wake up.  
  
It was a Sunday, and I woke late. It was a bright, sunny day and I stretched luxuriously on the comforter he had so thoughtfully provided on that tower floor. I reached out, expecting to find his warm body lying right beside me, and when I encountered nothing of the sort, I lazily opened my eyes and looked around the room.  
  
At first, I didn't see that he was dead. True, he was lying in a rather strange position away from me, but I didn't see the vial, nor the thick stream of blood running down his arm. I sneaked up over to him, intending to pounce, and stopped short only when I was right next to him.  
  
His eyes were closed. But for the blood, I wouldn't have realized even then that he had left me forever. I grew still, shock running through me, then tears streaming down my face, until after what seemed like an eternity, I had the sense to run and get help. It took me hours to run through that castle. In my hurry, I had forgotten the map, and took infinite wrong turnings in my haste to fetch someone to help. It was purely by luck that I found anyone at all, incidentally the person I would least have liked to see in that situation, but I needed someone, anyone. For the first time in my life, he took me at my word. Perhaps he saw the crazed look in my eyes, for indeed nothing else would have motivated him so quickly to my cause. It was him who confirmed that my lover was dead. And had been for some time. There was no way I had just let him die, for he was stone cold and the liquid around him had all but evaporated. Only a small bottle of it lay still on the desk. I thank him for that. It was his way of telling me that it wasn't my fault. He knew Snape would study it and tell me what it was, and how long it had taken him to brew. He had been planning this. He'd been planning it for some time, for the ingredients were strictly controlled and some were highly illegal. I could tell, that even to himself, that Snape was impressed by the measures he had taken, and the deviousness of the way he had taken them.  
  
I felt sick. Knowing that I knew nothing of the way my love was feeling, knowing that nothing I could have offered would have made any difference. Knowing that perhaps I had never really known him at all.  
  
Such thoughts plague me constantly. I always think, 'what if', before I check myself and firmly say that nothing I could have done would have made things different. But even to me, it seems like a poor excuse.  
  
I stayed in Dumbledore's office for a time, then was taken to the hospitable wing, where I was dosed to the point of delirium and subdued in a hard bed. They kept me there until they knew I would not harm myself, and could cope with what I had seen. They had succumbed to curiosity as well, just as I had. They knew what my lover had done.  
  
When I got back to Gryffindor tower, and met the eyes of my housemates once again, all I got was shock, surprise, and anger. Shock that I could keep this from them, surprise that I had done it in the first place and anger that I had lied to them. They hadn't expected me of all people to deceive them, that I had loved a member of the rival house. Nobody had sat there in silence and not judged me. They all had words to say.  
  
I cut myself off. I shied from their angry glances and hateful words, and withdrew into a world of my own making where he and I could be together forever. He had been right. Nobody would ever tear us apart.  
  
But after a while, teachers become worried. There are only so many excuses that they will accept, before they suspect and talk amongst themselves. Snape, in particular, and Dumbledore watched me. I am surprised, for it seemed for Snape had the perfect opportunity to let me die, when I so evidently wanted to. I guess he must have been speaking the truth all those years and never really wanted to kill me. Indeed, he kept a frustratingly close watch on me the months following my lover's death.  
  
I stopped working. Indeed, it almost became a game to me, to avoid the watchful eyes of Snape and the other teachers, and to wangle out of work. Hardly a night went by when I didn't have a detention. After a while, Snape began to give me detention even if I had done his work, just to keep an eye on me. It became our routine, to sit together for those hours and to avoid each other the rest of the time. At first he tried to counsel me, but after we had run out of things to say, we just sat in companionable silence, with him marking or testing new potions, and me sitting there dreaming.  
  
But dreaming wasn't enough for me, and never has been. The memories of what had happened still seemed more fresh than my most recent ones, and my mind teased me endlessly about it, tormenting me with the thought that, 'you could.'  
  
It was up to me. It was my choice, my decision. If I had any power at all in the world it was this. I could. I could repay the favor to my love, and join him, not in a fantasy, but in a place where our souls could stay together for all eternity. My mind constantly took me back to what he had done to himself, the ultimate compliment that spoke far higher than any words or touches could have done. We could finally be together again, and nothing and no one could keep us apart.  
  
You see, as I stood brewing that potion, which I had found in a book in the restricted section, I thought to perfect the ultimate irony. I would do it too. of course, I did not have a foolish young lover at my side, but it would work just as well without one. All I needed was the potion, and the scalpel.  
  
He'd cut out the dark mark that I had so ardently hated, and drawn my name instead. 


End file.
